Transformation and change

Here's the reflection that I shared in the Church of England's online service and at St Andrew's Wickford this morning:

The story of Jesus turning water into wine at the wedding in Cana is a highly symbolic story of transformation (John 2: 1 – 11). It is a story that happens on the third day; the day which will become the day of resurrection. The third day is the day when what was dead comes back to life and here, we have a story of a wedding feast which is about to descend into disaster as the wine fails but which is then saved when water is turned into wine.

The water which becomes wine is that which was used for ritual washing. There were many reasons in Jewish law why cleansing from ritual impurities was required, so this was water which was in regular use. Jesus turns this water into wine which, at the Last Supper, was to become the symbol of his death. This wine of his death, unlike the water, is a once-for-all sacrifice for sin, just as the miraculous wine created at this wedding was a never-to-be repeated wine.

The wine saves the wedding feast and reminds us of the wedding which is still come between the bridegroom Jesus and his bride, the Church. That marriage is a symbol of God’s coming kingdom in which the governing principle is, “love one another.” Through this symbolic action Jesus is also seen to have moved from being the carpenter’s son to being God’s Son, the Messiah.

So, we have a story which is rich in symbolism and one where the symbolism speaks of sacrifice and transformation. Each transformation involves something ordinary – water, a wedding, and a carpenter’s son. Throughout his ministry Jesus is constantly taking ordinary, everyday things and transforming them so that they express something of God and his kingdom:

Jesus takes water and transforms it into the very best wine.
Jesus takes a child’s lunch and feeds 5,000, with 12 baskets left over.
Jesus takes bread and wine saying this is my body and my blood.
Jesus takes human life and makes it reveal God.
Jesus takes the ordinary and transforms it.

Jesus tells stories of lost coins, lost sheep, lost people, of seeds and weeds, of yeast and mustard and figs, of shepherds and farmers, workers and tenants, masters and servants, widows and judges, the proud and the penitent, the beaten up and the foreigner, the wealthy and the starving.

Jesus says,
He is the bread of life, we will not hunger.
He is the water of life, we will not thirst.
He is the light of the world, we will see.
Jesus takes the ordinary and draws out revelation.

Jesus says,
We are the salt of the world, the taste bringers.
We are the light of the world, the clear sight bringers.
Jesus takes the foolish things of the world to shame the wise,
the weak things of the world to shame the strong,
the lowly things, despised things and the things that are not
to nullify the things that are.
Jesus called the 12 and the 72,
Those who were not wise, not influential, not of noble birth
to change the world.
Jesus calls you.

Jesus calls us to transformation. A transformation that is, as in the symbolism of this story, from constant impurity to purity through Jesus’ actions. This transformation occurs as we take into ourselves Christ’s sacrifice – as we drink the wine that represents his blood shed for us – and, when we do so, we become part of the best wedding feast possible – the wedding of Jesus and his bride the Church – which is the Kingdom of God, where the governing principle is, “love one another.”

Christianity is a religion of transformation and change because we are to grow into the likeness of Christ by being conformed to the pattern of his death and resurrection. We act out this story of transformation leading to celebration each time we celebrate communion. The bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ for us and we receive Christ into our lives being changed into his likeness in the process. We may arrive at communion as ordinary human beings but we leave as those who are being transformed into the very image and body of Christ himself.

Are we receiving Christ’s body and blood in order that we become like him? Is that why we come? Is that our prayer? Is that the one thing that we desire above all else?

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St Martin's Voices - I Am Changed.

The water of our lives and our communities can become wine

Here's the sermon I shared at St Andrew’s Wickford this morning:

The writer of John’s Gospel says that this miracle is the first that Jesus performed but the word used for first also means that it is the key miracle, the one that unlocks and explains all the others (John 2: 1 – 11). So, we need to ask ourselves what it is that we learn from this miracle that helps us to understand more fully what Jesus was doing through his ministry, death and resurrection.

The miracle is one of transformation; water being transformed into wine with this transformation bringing joy to the wedding guests. Fyodor Dostoevsky, in The Brother’s Karamasov, sees this miracle’s significance in the joy that Jesus brings to ordinary people: “It was not grief but men’s gladness that Jesus extolled when he worked his first miracle – he helped people to be happy … his heart was open … to the simple and artless joys of ignorant human beings, ignorant but not cunning, who had warmly bidden him to their poor wedding.” Later in John’s Gospel Jesus speaks himself about having come to bring life in all its fullness which must include this sense of joy and gladness in life. The filling of the water jars to the full also speaks of this sense of life being filled with goodness and gladness.

In Luke 6: 38 Jesus speaks again about fullness. Here he links our fullness to our giving: “Give to others, and God will give to you. Indeed, you will receive a full measure, a generous helping, poured out into your hands – all that you can hold.” This emphasis is important because the transformation of water into wine suggests that Jesus does not simply bless human life as it is but comes to transform it.

Water is essential to life. The human body is 75% water and needs a constant supply of water to function. The average person can only survive for about three days without any water at all. So, water is a basic need for all of us and speaks to us of the basic needs that we all need to be fulfilled in order that we can live and live comfortably.

But God wants something better for us than a life based just on the meeting of our basic needs and the turning of water into wine gives us a clue as to what that better thing is. Wine reminds us of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. That moment when, out of love for all people, he lays down his own life in order to save us from all that is wrong with our lives and our world. So, wine is a reminder to us of the fact that the greatest love is shown through sacrifice.

This is the transformation that Jesus seeks to bring to human life. It is a change from human existence to human life; a change from the selfish experience of meeting our own basic needs to the spiritual experience of sharing what we have will others; a change from the evolutionary imperative of the survival of the fittest to the Christian imperative of sacrificial love.

This transformation is something that we seek to show and need to show in our churches, which is in part why we have this new exhibition in church by Maciej Hoffman. Maciej chooses “themes that pervade everyday life, our constant battle with problems which we inevitably face … issues which haunt us for years, shaping our perspective on the world and building us as humans”. He seeks: “contrasts between imagination and reality. Our expectations and our anticipations are never what we finally meet in real life … whether it’s beauty and ugliness, order or chaos - the point is, how it’s reflected in the mirror of my interpretation … I am moved by people’s stories with all their misfortunes and moments of happiness. It seems like one is always part of the other.” This is our everyday experience that Jesus comes to transform.

This transformation is also symbolised in the pouring out of the wine from the water jars. It may even be that this is the moment of transformation; just as what is drawn from the water jars to be shared with others is wine so, as we give to others, we are transformed from selfish to sacrificial. It may be that it is in the act of giving that our transformation comes. That is also why, alongside Maciej’s exhibition, we are unveiled David Folley’s descent from the cross, which shows us the reality of the suffering that was entailed in the ultimate sacrifice made for us on the cross by Christ.

Finally, there is significance in the reference to the role of the water jars in ritual washing. The water jars can be seen as signifying the Jewish faith that requires such ritual cleansing but from those jars and from that faith comes a new wine that must be poured out and shared with others. The new wine is for all; not just for the first but kept for the last as well. Wine symbolises the blood of Christ which is shed for all. God’s grace is no longer contained solely within the confines of the Jewish faith; coming to God no longer requires the meeting of the standards of the Law. This new wine bursts the old skins and is shared with all people of every nation, race, gender, age and sexuality.

So, we see depicted a change from the old order, the old covenant, to the new. And this change extends the transformation to all. What is depicted then is not solely a change for us as individuals but a societal change no longer affecting one nation but all nations. What is depicted is a new way of life, a new way of being human, which can, perhaps, be summed up in the words of John 15: 13, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends”. He looks at all of us, at all human beings, and says, “You are my friends”. Jesus allowed his own life to end so that all people could know what it is like to really live.

In 21st century Britain we live in a culture that is parched and dry and desperately in need of the water of life. I still remember a Guardian article outlining reasons why kindness has gone out of fashion in the age of the free market and the selfish gene. The writers noted that “for most of western history the dominant tradition of kindness has been Christianity” which “functioned as a cultural cement, binding individuals into society” until “the Christian rule ‘love thy neighbour as thyself’ came under increasing attack from competitive individualism.” Our society is parched of kindness and we need Jesus to bring transformation.

In Isaiah we read: “The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. But I the LORD will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs.” (Isaiah 41. 17 & 18)

Jesus is the river that flows in the desert of our selfish, self-centred existence because he shows us how to live in his new way of being human, loving God with all our being and loving our neighbours as ourselves. God wants us to look at Jesus and see how human life was originally intended to be lived before we chose the path of self-centredness. It is when we look at Jesus and begin to live life his way that transformation comes in our lives and our world. The water of our lives and our communities can become wine. May it be so for us. Amen.

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Judee Sill - The Donor.

ArtWay: Interview with Belinda Scarlett

My latest artist interview for ArtWay is with Belinda Scarlett, theatre costume and set designer and ecclesiastical textile artist :

'I have just completed an altar cloth for St Philip and St James Leckhampton, Cheltenham. This was worked on four sides and included a set of vestments in the four liturgical colours. Awareness of climate change was the basis for this work. The intense vibrant band of turquoise light that encircles Planet Earth as seen from space fills me with awe. As climate change is affecting every corner of this planet it seemed appropriate to set each of the four panels within the infinite dark of space and to evoke the four elements: Water, Air, Fire, Earth. Water shows the currents of the oceans. Air the dawn of a new day, jetstream, a feather. Fire, refining fire that both destroys and brings new life. Earth is framed by a rainbow. The focus is in the central image of the adult’s hand holding soil in which a seedling has sprouted. This is offered to a little child whose hands are eager to receive it. May the beauty and the wonder of creation of this precious world we inhabit be here for generations to come.'

My visual meditations include work by María Inés Aguirre, Giampaolo Babetto, Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Alexander de Cadenet, Christopher Clack, Marlene Dumas, Terry Ffyffe, Jake Flood, Antoni Gaudi, Nicola Green, Maciej Hoffman, Lakwena Maciver, S. Billie Mandle, Giacomo Manzù, Sidney Nolan, Michael Pendry, Maurice Novarina, Regan O'Callaghan, Ana Maria Pacheco, John Piper, Nicola Ravenscroft, Albert Servaes, Henry Shelton, Anna Sikorska, Jan Toorop, Edmund de Waal and Sane Wadu.

My Church of the Month reports include: All Saints Parish Church, Tudeley, Aylesford Priory, Canterbury Cathedral, Chapel of St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, Hem, Chelmsford Cathedral, Churches in Little Walsingham, Coventry Cathedral, Église de Saint-Paul à Grange-Canal, Eton College Chapel, Lumen, Metz Cathedral, Notre Dame du Léman, Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce, Plateau d’Assy,Romont, Sint Martinuskerk Latem, St Aidan of Lindisfarne, St Alban Romford, St. Andrew Bobola Polish RC Church, St. Margaret’s Church, Ditchling, and Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, St Mary the Virgin, Downe, St Michael and All Angels Berwick and St Paul Goodmayes, as well as earlier reports of visits to sites associated with Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Marc Chagall, Jean Cocteau, Antoni Gaudi and Henri Matisse.

Blogs for ArtWay include: Congruity and controversy: exploring issues for contemporary commissions;
Photographing Religious Practice; Spirituality and/in Modern Art; and The Spirituality of the Artist-Clown.

Interviews for ArtWay include: Sophie Hacker and Peter Koenig. I also interviewed ArtWay founder Marleen Hengelaar Rookmaaker for Artlyst.

I have reviewed: Art and the Church: A Fractious Embrace, Kempe: The Life, Art and Legacy of Charles Eamer Kempe and Jazz, Blues, and Spirituals.

Other of my writings for ArtWay can be found here. My pieces for Church Times can be found here. Those for Artlyst are here and those for Art+Christianity are here. See also Modern religious art: airbrushed from art history?

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Arvo Pärt - De Profundis.

Seeing the gifts God is giving

Here's the reflection I shared in today's Choral Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields:

In today’s Old Testament reading (Exodus 17.1-7), we're with the People of Israel after the Exodus in the midst of the wilderness where there is no water. The sun is beating down and we're dehydrating. We're also complaining - quite understandably, because the situation is dire, and it looks as though we're likely to die. We want to go back to Egypt because, although we were slaves there, ill-treated and exploited, at least we knew where our food and drink was coming from.

But at the point when all seems lost and hope is exhausted, God reveals the hidden spring of water within this wilderness landscape. As a result, it looks as though God was somewhat late in arriving on the scene. The singer songwriter Sam Phillips writes that:

'Help is coming, help is coming
One day late, one day late
After you've given up and all is gone
Help is coming one day late'

She continues:

'Try to understand, you try to fix your broken hands
But remember that there always has been good
Like stars you don't see in the day sky
Wait till night

Life has kept me down
I've been growing under ground
Now I'm coming up and when time opens the earth
You'll see love has been moving all around us, making waves

So help is coming, help is coming
One day late, one day late
After you've given up and all is gone
Help is coming one day late'

In her song, help, goodness, life and hope are all around but hidden or overlooked, as was the vital spring of water in the wilderness. Maybe, the issue is not one of God turning later than we expect but instead that how we perceive things needs to change in order that we start to see what is in fact already there.

As Christians, we don’t have to look far for a mission statement for the church. ‘I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.’ (John 10.10) Living abundant life. That’s what the Father intends, the Son embodies, the Spirit facilitates. God is a God of abundance who is continually giving us all we need even in the midst of scarcity and trouble; perhaps, especially, in the midst of scarcity and trouble.

Our problem is that we don’t always recognise and receive the gifts that God is giving. In order to see what God is giving us, our mindset needs to change from a deficit mindset which sees problems to an asset mindset which looks for resources. The Israelites had a deficit mindset as they were focused on the problems they were experiencing and that was what led them to complain. It meant they weren’t looking around them to see what assets there were where they were. When we develop a habit of looking for assets, we then begin looking at our situation widely and broadly and notice what is ordinarily hidden to us by being on the edge.

I wonder whether the experience of the Israelites in undercovering the hidden spring of water in the wilderness is not somewhat similar to the experience many of us have had in the pandemic; of help, of goodness, of life, of hope being there in plain sight within our local communities but only seen, appreciated and valued when we were forced to stop and look and reflect. Community like never before. Kindness at its proper level. These were some of the discoveries of the first lockdown. Qualities that were always there within our communities but only revived and received in the adversity of the pandemic.

Let’s make that love normal by praying for eyes to see and ears to hear, that we might receive all that God, in his abundance, wishes to give us; receiving those gifts in the form in which they are given to us. Amen.

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Sam Phillips - One Day Late.

ArtWay Visual Meditation - Jake Flood: Reflection

My latest Visual Meditation for ArtWay is on Jake Flood's 'Reflection' from the Chaiya Art Awards 2021 winners exhibition:

'Flood’s image sets the square edged weir at the centre creating a space that is empty and dark. The apophatic tradition in Christianity maintains that the place of emptiness – both personally and through the renunciation of images – is the place of encounter with God. As several Psalms suggest darkness can be a covering for God and, also, our closest friend.

Fringing the central space are reflections of the Cathedral’s stained glass which lie beyond the sculpture, but which the water’s stillness enables us to glimpse. Although the centre of the image is empty and monochrome, Flood’s image shares with us the surrounding diversity of colour. We cannot fully see the stained glass or read its story but can see sufficient to appreciate its richness.'

My exhibition review for Church Times can be found at https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2021/21-may/books-arts/visual-arts/chaiya-art-awards-god-is-at-gallery-oxo. See my article for Artlyst sharing reflections on the experience of having been a judge for the Chaiya Art Awards 2021. The reflection I shared on the Chaiya Art Awards 2021 in a Bread for the World service at St Martin-in-the-Fields can be found here. My Artlyst interview of Chaiya Art Awards founder Katrina Moss can be read here and my ArtWay visual meditation on the winning entry in the 2018 Awards is here.

My other visual meditations for ArtWay include work by María Inés Aguirre, Giampaolo Babetto, Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Alexander de Cadenet, Christopher Clack, Marlene Dumas, Terry Ffyffe, Antoni Gaudi, Nicola Green, Maciej Hoffman, Lakwena Maciver, S. Billie Mandle, Giacomo Manzù, Michael Pendry, Maurice Novarina, Regan O'Callaghan, Ana Maria Pacheco, John Piper, Nicola Ravenscroft, Albert Servaes, Henry Shelton, Anna Sikorska and Edmund de Waal.

My Church of the Month reports for ArtWay are: Aylesford Priory, Canterbury Cathedral, Chapel of St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, Hem, Chelmsford Cathedral, Churches in Little Walsingham, Coventry Cathedral, Église de Saint-Paul à Grange-Canal, Eton College Chapel, Lumen, Metz Cathedral, Notre Dame du Léman, Notre-Dame de Toute Grâce, Plateau d’Assy,Romont, Sint Martinuskerk Latem, St Aidan of Lindisfarne, St Alban Romford, St. Andrew Bobola Polish RC Church, St. Margaret’s Church, Ditchling, and Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, St Mary the Virgin, Downe, St Michael and All Angels Berwick, and St Paul Goodmayes, as well as earlier reports of visits to sites associated with Marian Bohusz-Szyszko, Marc Chagall, Jean Cocteau, Antoni Gaudi and Henri Matisse.

Interviews for ArtWay include: Sophie Hacker and Peter Koenig. I also interviewed ArtWay founder Marleen Hengelaar Rookmaaker for Artlyst. My blogs for ArtWay include: Photographing Religious Practice and Contemporary Commissions. I have also reviewed: Art and the Church: A Fractious Embrace, Kempe: The Life, Art and Legacy of Charles Eamer Kempe, and Jazz, Blues, and Spirituals.

Other of my writings for ArtWay can be found here. My pieces for Church Times can be found here, those for Artlyst here, and those for Art+Christianity are here.

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Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - Hand Of God.

The life of Jesus reproduced in our lives

Here is my sermon for today's Choral Eucharist at St Martin-in-the-Fields:

Stephen Verney begins his commentary on this passage (John 15. 1 - 8) with a great evocation of the way in which vines are grown: “On a stony hillside above his house, where the thyme grows and the prickly pear, and a wild fig tree fights for its existence in a pocket of shallow soil, a farmer decides to plant a vine. In the autumn he clears a terrace, and brings top soil. He sets a post for the vine to climb, and fixes horizontal supports for its branches. Then in the spring he plants it and fences it against the goats; as it grows he trains it, and in the following autumn he prunes it back.

The vine depends for its life on the farmer, but equally the farmer depends on the vine. For the vine can do what the farmer cannot; it can take the rain that falls on the hillside and convert it into grapes, which the farmer can harvest and tread out in his wine-press, and pour the juice into his vat to ferment and bubble. The farmer and the vine are dependent on each other, and the purpose for which they work together is that water should be turned into wine.” Jesus is the vine, his Father is the farmer. They are dependent one on the other although their roles are different. Their shared purpose is that water is turned into wine; that the vine is fruitful and that its fruit becomes wine shared with others as the sign and symbol of Jesus’ blood. The process for achieving this can itself be painful; involving pruning and crushing.

We are part of this picture because there is one vine but many branches. Each one of us as we become Christians is grafted into the vine to become part of the vine itself. Verney writes: “I AM the vine, and you are the branches. Dwell in me, and I in you. Here is teaching both simple and profound, to move the human heart. If the branch dwells in the vine, then the life of the vine dwells in the branch. If the branch grows out of the stem, and out of the roots which are drawing up the goodness of the soil and the rain, then the sap of the vine flows into the branch, and the pattern of the vine’s life unfolds itself through each branch to produce bunches of grapes. So it will be, says Jesus, between you and me. If you do not dwell in me you cannot bear fruit …”

How do we dwell in Jesus? To keep our life dwelling in Christ’s, we must continually renew our decision that “what has been done once for all on the cross by Jesus shall the basis, the starting point, the context of all my thinking and deciding and doing,” writes Lesslie Newbigin. We feed this decision by protecting time for prayer, bible study and worship in our busy lives and schedules. As we do so, the sap of the vine, the life of Christ, flows into us and we produce fruit. The fruit of the vine is, as Newbigin again writes, “the life of Jesus reproduced in the midst of the life of the world, the pure love and obedience by which people will recognise the disciples of Jesus, the branches of the real vine.”

This fruit, the life of Jesus reproduced in our lives, is the real test of whether or not we are actually dwelling in the vine, in Jesus. In recent years, we have come to know much more about the spiritual life of Mother Teresa, someone whose face shone with the all-encompassing joy of one for whom “to live is Christ.” Everyone who knew her assumed that she was supported in her ministry through a deep and abiding sense of Christ’s presence with her.

Yet the opposite was true. Mother Teresa lived feeling as if she did not believe: “I have no faith” – “They say people in hell suffer eternal pain because of the loss of God … in my soul I feel just that terrible pain of loss – of God not being God – of God not really existing.” Her sense of feeling that there was no God has been revealed in letters that she wrote to her spiritual confidantes. Yet, as Sister Wendy Beckett has written, “this woman who felt that there was no God and lived in emotional anguish was also profoundly aware, intellectually, that God was her total life and that she lived only to love him.” This was what was apparent in her life and ministry and this fruit showed that whatever she felt about the absence of God in her life, she was still a live branch in the vine.

Ultimately, the fruit of our lives - the life of Jesus reproduced in our lives – is the sign of whether we are healthy branches dwelling in the vine. Prayer, bible study and worship are channels for the life of Christ to flow into our lives rather than the sign than his life is flowing into our own. As we are grafted into the vine, into Jesus, we receive his life flowing through us and take on his characteristics – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. These characteristics result in acts of love because love must act, as we saw in the life of Mother Teresa. While hate could be indifference or inaction, love is always active and must respond practically to the needs we see around us.

This Christian Aid week we can use our spheres of influence to give, act and pray, and in this way support the loving, sacrificial selflessness of Christian Aid partners who support and empower those they serve. We can choose active love over inactive indifference and, together with Christian Aid and others like them, create a powerful force for change which derives from the life of Christ flowing into us as we dwell in him and where our active love is the fruit of the vine - the life of Jesus reproduced in our lives.

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Gregory Porter & Beverley Knight - Mary Did You Know.

'Baptism- A Radical Act’

'Baptism- A Radical Act’: An art exhibition featuring artwork produced by those who live with homelessness, and by other artists associated with Bloomsbury. It invites reflection on the theme of radical dissent within the religious and political sphere.

23-27 January, 10am-4pm, Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church, 235 Shaftesbury Avenue, London, WC2H 8EP

An installation of artwork and photography will be on display daily, with further information on the history of the Baptist tradition of radical religious dissent, and the politics of water in the contemporary world.

Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church has been working with the homeless and vulnerable of Central London for nearly 170 years, and has a philosophy of ‘inclusion’, where all are invited to participate in the community life of the church. Many of those who live with homelessness are artistic and creative, and the purpose of this exhibition is to display artwork by a diversity of artists.

This project is part of the ‘Still Reforming’ programme by the ‘Reformation’ churches of Central London, to mark 2017 as the 500th anniversary of the reformation. www.reformation500.uk. Find out more about these reformation events by downloading the brochure "Still Reforming".

https://www.facebook.com/BloomsburyBaptist/posts/1539525669410772

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Michael Kiwanuka - Always Waiting.

Start:Stop - Water into wine

Bible reading

“… standing there were six stone water jars for the Jewish rites of purification, each holding twenty or thirty gallons. Jesus said to them, “Fill the jars with water.” And they filled them up to the brim. He said to them, “Now draw some out, and take it to the chief steward.” So they took it. When the steward tasted the water that had become wine, and did not know where it came from (though the servants who had drawn the water knew), the steward called the bridegroom and said to him, “Everyone serves the good wine first, and then the inferior wine after the guests have become drunk. But you have kept the good wine until now.” Jesus did this, the first of his signs, in Cana of Galilee, and revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him. (John 2. 6 – 11)

Meditation

Water is essential to life. The human body is 75% water and needs a constant supply of water to function. The average person can only survive for about three days without any water at all. So, water is a basic need for all of us and speaks to us of the basic needs that we all need to be fulfilled in order that we can live and live comfortably. This is why we pray, in the Lord’s Prayer, give us this day our daily bread. This is a prayer for our basic needs.

But God wants something better for us than a life based just on the meeting of our basic needs and the turning of water into wine gives us a clue as to what that better thing is. Wine reminds us of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross; that moment when, out of love for all people, he lays down his own life in order to save us from all that is wrong with our lives and our world. So, wine is a reminder to us of the fact that the greatest love is shown through sacrifice.

This is the transformation that Jesus seeks to bring to human life. It is a change from human existence to human life; a change from the selfish experience of meeting our own basic needs to the spiritual experience of sharing what we have will others; a change from the evolutionary imperative of the survival of the fittest to the Christian imperative of sacrificial love.

We all have a need and a desire for there to be more to our lives than simply the survival of the fittest; the scramble to meet our basic needs. Yet when we are in genuine need and poverty, it is very difficult to think about anything else other than survival. But, then, when we are in the fortunate position of having our basic needs met, we have the time and space and (hopefully) inclination to look around us to develop a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to that by sharing at least some of what we have.

This transformation is symbolised in the pouring out of the wine from the water jars. It may even be that this is the moment of transformation. Just as what is drawn from the water jars to be shared with others is wine, so as we give to others we are transformed from selfish to sacrificial. It may be that it is in the act of giving that our transformation comes.

Prayer

Dear God, give us this day our basic needs; all that we need to be fulfilled in order that we live and live comfortably. We pray this, though, that we have the time and space and inclination to look around us to develop a compassion, like that of Jesus, which sees the needs of those whose basic needs are not being met and responds to that by sharing at least some of what we have.

Give us this day our daily bread, then use our lives in giving to others.

Dear God, You promise in Psalm 23 to be close beside us and protect us even as we walk through the darkest valley. We claim this promise for those who trek to get water for their families. Stay close to them, strengthen them, and protect them. We thank You for an end to drought in places such as the Horn of Africa. We pray that families in West Africa and elsewhere will have enough rain to grow food crops.

Give us this day our daily bread, then use our lives in giving to others.

Dear God, remind us of Your command to love our neighbours as we love ourselves. Don't let us rest until we know we have done everything we can to meet the basic needs of others, particularly for clean water. Give wisdom to Your people in relief agencies as they seek to bring clean water and other lifesaving interventions to millions more families around the globe. Thank You for equipping those who love You as they bring new health and opportunities to the world's most vulnerable people.

Give us this day our daily bread, then use our lives in giving to others.

Blessing

Meeting our basic needs, developing a compassion like that of Jesus, equipping us to bring health and opportunities to the world’s most vulnerable. May those blessings of almighty God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be with us and rest upon us, now and always. Amen.

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Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Oh My Lord.

Sermon: The moment of transformation

This was my sermon for the Eucharist at St Vedast-alias-Foster this morning:

The writer of John’s Gospel says that this miracle is the first that Jesus performed but the word used for first also means that it is the key miracle, the one that unlocks and explains all the others (John 2: 1 – 11). So we need to ask ourselves what it is that we learn from this miracle that helps us to understand more fully what Jesus was doing through his ministry, death and resurrection.

The miracle is one of transformation; water being transformed into wine with this transformation bringing joy to the wedding guests. Dostoevsky, in The Brothers Karamasov, sees this miracle’s significance in the joy that Jesus brings to ordinary people: “It was not grief but men’s gladness that Jesus extolled when he worked his first miracle – he helped people to be happy … his heart was open … to the simple and artless joys of ignorant human beings, ignorant but not cunning, who had warmly bidden him to their poor wedding.” Later in John’s Gospel Jesus speaks himself about having come to bring life in all its fullness which must include this sense of joy and gladness in life. The filling of the water jars to the full also speaks of this sense of life being filled with goodness and gladness.

In Luke 6: 38 Jesus speaks again about fullness. Here he links our fullness to our giving: “Give to others, and God will give to you. Indeed, you will receive a full measure, a generous helping, poured out into your hands – all that you can hold.” This emphasis is important because the transformation of water into wine suggests that Jesus does not simply bless human life as it is but comes to transform it.

Water is essential to life. The human body is 75% water and needs a constant supply of water to function. The average person can only survive for about three days without any water at all. So, water is a basic need for all of us and speaks to us of the basic needs that we all need to be fulfilled in order that we can live and live comfortably.

But God wants something better for us than a life based just on the meeting of our basic needs and the turning of water into wine gives us a clue as to what that better thing is. Wine reminds us of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. That moment when, out of love for all people, he lays down his own life in order to save us from all that is wrong with our lives and our world. So, wine is a reminder to us of the fact that the greatest love is shown through sacrifice.

This is the transformation that Jesus seeks to bring to human life. It is a change from human existence to human life; a change from the selfish experience of meeting our own basic needs to the spiritual experience of sharing what we have will others; a change from the evolutionary imperative of the survival of the fittest to the Christian imperative of sacrificial love.

This transformation is also symbolised in the pouring out of the wine from the water jars. It may even be that this is the moment of transformation just as what is drawn from the water jars to be shared with others is wine so as we give to others we are transformed from selfish to sacrificial. It may be that it is in the act of giving that our transformation comes.

There is also significance in the reference to the role of the water jars in ritual washing. The water jars can be seen as signifying the Jewish faith that require such ritual cleansing but from those jars and from that faith comes a new wine that must be poured out and shared with others. The new wine is for all; not just for the first but kept for the last as well. Wine symbolises the blood of Christ which is shed for all. God’s grace is no longer contained solely within the confine of the Jewish faith; coming to God no longer requires the meeting of the standards of the Law. This new wine bursts the old skins and is shared with all people of every nation, race, gender, age and sexuality.

So we see depicted a change from the old order, the old covenant, to the new. And this change extends the transformation to all. What is depicted then is not solely a change for us as individuals but a societal change no longer affecting one nation but all nations. What is depicted is a new way of life, a new way of being human, which can, perhaps, be summed up in the words of John 15: 13, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends”. He looks at all of us, at all human beings, and says, “You are my friends”. Jesus allowed his own life to end so that all people could know what it is like to really live.

In 21st century Britain we live in a culture that is parched and dry and desperately in need of the water of life. I still remember a Guardian article outlining reasons why kindness has gone out of fashion in the age of the free market and the selfish gene. The writers noted that “for most of western history the dominant tradition of kindness has been Christianity” which “functioned as a cultural cement, binding individuals into society” until “the Christian rule ‘love thy neighbour as thyself’ came under increasing attack from competitive individualism.” Our society is parched of kindness and we need Jesus to bring transformation.

In Isaiah we read: “The poor and needy search for water, but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. But I the LORD will answer them; I, the God of Israel, will not forsake them. I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs.” (Isaiah 41. 17 & 18)

Our Psalm promised that we shall be satisfied with the abundance of God’s house; we shall drink from the river of God’s delights. For with God is the well of life and in his light shall we see light (Psalm 36).

Jesus is the river that flows in the desert of our selfish, self-centred existence because he shows us how to live in his new way of being human, loving God with all our being and loving our neighbours as ourselves. God wants us to look at Jesus and see how human life was originally intended to be lived before we chose the path of self-centredness. It is when we look at Jesus and begin to live life his way that transformation comes in our lives and our world. The water of our lives and our communities can become wine.

When that is so for us as individuals, as communities and even as a nation then, as we heard in our reading from Isaiah, we shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God. You shall no more be termed Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate (Isaiah 62. 1 – 5).

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The Waterboys - My Love Is My Rock In The Weary Land.

Armageddon: Mariano Chelo

Rather late in the day, as the exhibition is over, but here is my review of Armageddon at ArtMoorHouse:

Armageddon has begun in the City of London. The countdown to Apocalypse is over and an existential explosion has covered the ground floor walls of Moor House in Moorgate.

Mariano Chelo, from Bosa in Sardinia, is an abstract, installation and performance artist who founded MAP (Movementi Artistici Periferici), a gallery/workshop where he has exhibited his own and other artists’ works. While he has shown work internationally, this is his first solo show in the UK. In his work Chelo has journeyed from traditional beginnings – landscapes, still life and figure studies – through a period of collaboration with advertising agencies - as he abandoned painting for photography and graphic design in the 1980s – to the extravagant expressionism of his current abstractions and action painting performances.

Armageddon features paintings formed out of darkness. Beginning with inky blacks swirled and dripped and covered in the sheen and shimmer of varnish, these are works exploring the emotions of an underworld – physical or personal, in which a limited palette of colours, under pressure, boil and churn to rise in spurts and splurges of volcanic red. ‘Illusione Russo’ is split by a jet-black crevice from which beautiful surges of fiery oranges and reds flow to fill the canvas. ‘Confusamente Russo’ and ‘Russo’ fill their canvasses with the flicker and flare of flame.

Fire is, therefore, one motif Chelo uses for the experience of personal and social Armageddon. Water is another. Biblical motifs underpin much musing generally on apocalypse and Chelo, while not foregrounding Biblical references, certainly has images of deluge and flood within his frame. ‘Oblivion’, in particular, evokes - in blues, blacks and whites - the submerging of our world and consciousness. He ends the show more peacefully, using blacks, greys and whites, by depicting the stillness of the sea in evocative works (‘Mare’ and ‘Mare II’) which divide at the horizon as we are enveloped in darkness by the setting of the sun.

Chelo maintains a balance throughout between the personal, the natural and the social in these works. It could be personal and cultural apocalypse that we are viewing. At times, his shapes suggest cityscapes or caverns yet, here too, our perceptions can be both of physical chaos and of the collapse of our interior world. As the exhibition catalogue suggests, this sequence of images is a migration ‘through a deep dark sea’, ‘a “passage” towards the unexplored, a metaphor to express our inability to fully know the result of our quests.’

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Extreme - Politicalamity.

Metaphysical symbol of purity and spiritual transformation

ArtMoorHouse is a creative space in a Norman Foster building at the heart of the City of London which provides the setting for a successful synergy between Art and Business.

Their current show is by Maria Ines Aguirre and is entitled The Element of Freedom. The element in question is water which is described as follows:

'Water is the carrier of nature, the pulse of life. Water changes itself info as many natures as the different places throng which it runs. Water does not resist, it flows, always going to where it wants to, so, in the end, nothing can resist it.

Metaphysical symbol of purity and spiritual transformation, water is the allegory of a new founded freedom; a freedom which is gained independently through the the ability to adapt to changing of the circumstances, whilst always remaining true to ourselves.'

Aguirre's work stands out for its colour, energy and spontaneity. Her fascination with the connections between music and colour led her to become the first visual artist in residence at Steinway & Sons, London, where she transformed a Steinway Model D concert grand piano into 'Dancing Soul'.

Pierre Restany wrote the following about Aguirre's work: 'We have become too intellectual in our ways of perceiving things. The dominance of rational thought over activities based on feeling prevents us from understanding the fullest dimension of any concept... For Mia, emotion is colour and colour is the virtual expression of emotions.'

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Joni Mitchell - Hejira.

ArtWay meditation: The Doors of Perception

Having made the initial introduction, I'm very pleased to see that John Espin and Tim Harrold's assemblage The Doors of Perception features as this week's ArtWay meditation.

The assemblage contains four themes which use images of water, a lion's roar, white stones, and stars.

The title is taken from William Blake's statement that 'If the doors of perception were cleansed everything would appear to man as it is, infinite':

'The title came after the completion of the piece. Doors connect each of the four scenes. Each door leads to somewhere else. Doors to be knocked on and doors to be opened. Jesus said, ‘I am the door,’ the Gateway for the sheep.'

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Dry The River - Everlasting Light.

Earthairwaterfire exhibition

I've spent today assisting Bishop David with his marvellous Earthairwaterfire exhibition at St Peter's Harold Wood. We have had tremendous support and help in hanging the show from folk at St Peter's which has enabled Bishop David to show both his largest expansive landscapes together with smaller more intimate work.

Bishop David is fascinated by the organic structure of landscape and its transitory appearance as weather and light pass over it. Like landscape, many of these pieces are layered whether composed using stripes of colour or collage. The concept for the exhibition comes from the Prayer of Anthony the Great; 'Keep us alive with the earth of humility, with the air of contemplation, with the water of remorse and the fire of love.'

The opening times for the exhibition are: Weekdays 9.00am - 5.00pm. Saturday 15th March 9.00am - 12.30pm. Evenings Wednesdays and Fridays 6.00pm - 9.30pm. The exhibition is open until Friday 21st March.

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Lifehouse - Aftermath.

Bill Viola: The slowing of time to create meditative space

Bill Viola is described by the American Academy of Religion as a "pioneering video artist whose internationally exhibited work explores universal human experiences - birth, death, the unfolding of consciousness - and has its roots in religious traditions including Zen Buddhism, Islamic Sufism, and Christian mysticism."

Frustrated Actions and Futile Gestures is a museum-scale exhibition of nine new works by Viola at Blain|Southern. "Created between 2012 and 2013, both on location and in the artist’s studio in Southern California, the exhibition presents three distinct bodies of works; the Frustrated Actions, the Mirage and the Water Portraits series. Through these works, Viola engages with complex aspects of human experience, including mortality, transience and our persistent, yet ultimately futile attempts to truly and objectively understand ourselves and the meaning of our brief lives."

Much of Viola's work features the slowing of time (see, in particular, the four works from the Mirage series) in order to create meditative space for reflection on his core themes, all of which resonate with religious beliefs and significance:

"In Man Searching for Immortality/Woman Searching for Eternity (2013) a man and woman in the later stages of their lives emerge out of the darkness, pausing to explore their own naked bodies with torches, a daily routine search for disease and decay. The figures are projected onto two seven-foot high black granite slabs, suggestive of tombstones, which evoke a sense of impending mortality. The diptych, Man with His Soul (2013) presents us with a man sitting on a chair, waiting, though we will never discover exactly what he is waiting for. The left hand screen – in high-definition video – depicts his conscious self, while the right – shot in grainy black and white – portrays his soul, his inner being. Thus, the viewer is confronted with a juxtaposition of physical and psychological realities. Angel at the Door (2013) continues to explore this theme of the ‘inner self’; a cycle develops whereby a man hears a knocking at the door, but each time he opens it, he finds no one there – only a dark void. When he opens the door for the final time, however, there is an explosion, revealing a mirror image of himself – offering a thought-provoking insight into man’s inevitable and unavoidable confrontation with his ‘inner self’."

Viola has said that art resides in life itself, "that as a practice it derives primarily from the quality of experience, depth of thought and devotion of the maker": "Everything else, virtuosity with the materials, novelty of the idea or approach, innovation in craft or technique, skill of presentation, historical significance, importance of the venue, in short, almost everything I learned to value in art school - was secondary."

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All Things Bright and Beautiful - The Transfiguration Part 1.

Spiritual Life: To dance around one another in relationship

Here is my Spiritual Life column for the current edition of the Ilford Recorder:

Explaining the idea of the Trinity - three persons, one God - has always been a challenge to priests and preachers. The shamrock is one favourite illustration - three leaves, one stem - as is water - two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen forming one entity which can be a liquid, a solid and a gas.

My favourite image, though, is not of the form of the Trinity but of its dynamism and dynamic. That image is of a dance as the Greek word for the relationship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit - perichoresis - means ‘to dance around one another in relationship.’ Dance partners interact “within a rhythm which remains the same but in a continuous variety of movements.” At its best, you have people totally in tune with one another for the period of that dance.

This is what the united relationship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit is thought to be in the Christian faith and it means that at the very heart of God is a dynamic relationship in which a constant exchange of love is underway. We could call it the dance of love. Being in relationship with God means, for the Christian, being drawn into that constant, eternal exchange or dance of love. Jesus describes this when he says that he is in the Father and the Father in him. He then extends that same relationship to others too - I am in you and you are in me.

To really know love, Christianity suggests, we must be drawn into the dance of love which Father, Son and Holy Spirit share and which is at the very heart of God.

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Leonard Cohen - Dance Me To The End Of Love.

Column of Light - St Pancras Church

The installation "Column of Light" by Bob Aldous at St Pancras Church sounds fascinating as it has many of the elements - light, water, reflection, the 'beyond' - which feature in my 'Windows on the world' series and which I find attractive and of interest in the work of other artists:

"The installation "Column of Light" by Bob Aldous will be shown at St Pancras Church from the 4th to the 27th January 2013. It is a monumental work, which combines the use of light and water with dramatic effect.

The art of Bob Aldous often uses site-specific interiors, to create artworks that intrigue and draw in the viewer. St Pancras Church is well known for its exhibition space in its Crypt. The design of the church being inspired by the temple of Erectheum on the Acropolis with the caryatid porch and its marble interior. 

"Column of light" uses a symbolic language that makes full use of the interior surroundings.

A column of light rises from the church floor towards the apex of the church. Beneath it a pool of water acts as a mirror. Sometimes still, other times moving, The water reflecting the architecture, the light column and shadows of the viewer that appear to penetrate the stone floor.

The Art Installation is mesmerising and meditative: an illusion that draws us into the still water revealing a presence that appears to emanate from another space or a different time.

Bob Aldous is an artist who often uses narrative to communicate abstract and metaphysical ideas with his audience. His work has an intensity and directness that is both poetic and profound. Details can be seen at bobaldous.com."

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Sam Phillips - Reflecting Light.

I AM who I AM

I AM who I AM
The name of God, I AM
The Word God speaks, I AM
In the beginning,
before time began, I AM
Do not be afraid, I AM

I AM alpha and omega
I AM beginning and end
I AM artist of the galaxies
I AM light of the cosmos
I AM ground of being
I AM in eternity

I AM human and divine
I AM the to and fro
of faith and love
between Father and Son
I AM marriage of flesh and Spirit
I AM union of earth and heaven

I AM sent by the Father
I AM dialogue
I AM conversation
I AM communication
I AM the door
and the door is open

I AM shepherd,
laying down my life for the sheep
I AM servant,
washing the feet of my disciples
I AM vine,
into which you are grafted

I AM the ladder
between earth and heaven
on which you ascend
I AM the way on which you travel
I AM the truth which is being revealed
I AM the life you are raised to live

I AM living water, living bread
I AM water into wine, slaking thirst
I AM broken bread, satisfying hunger
When I AM lifted up, raised up,
you will know I AM who I AM
I AM the resurrection

I AM has sent me to you
Follow the way I AM
Believe the truth I AM
Live the life I AM
I AM in you and you in I AM
Be together what I AM
I AM who I AM
I AM you, you are I AM

(based on the writings of Stephen Verney)

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Moving On

Yesterday I took my final assembly as a College Chaplain at St Edward's Church of England School and was given a wonderful send off by staff and students. This is what I said in the assembly:

I’m currently running the confirmation preparation course for our group of churches and in it we start off with the idea that life is a journey on which we can go together with God. The starting point for going on a journey through life with God is baptism and when people are baptised in church we use these three things – oil, light and water – to think about how we start out on the journey. The sign of the cross is made on our forehead to mark us as belonging to God, we are given a lighted candle symbolising the light of Christ that has come into our lives, and water is poured over us as a sign of dying to our old life and rising into a new life together with God.

These three symbols aren’t just for starting out on the journey, though, they are also about the way we can move on. Oil gets things moving again when they have got stuck, light is about seeing the way forward clearly, and water is about going with the flow of God’s Spirit.

This is the time of year when many of us – me included – are getting ready to move on in different ways; leaving day meant that some who had been here are no longer here while in the new academic year we will be a year further on with new and different challenges to face. In whatever way we may be moving on, these symbols of oil, light and water can help to remind that God goes with us on the journey.

Here is a meditation which reminds of their significance.

Oil …

bleeding

from the pressurised

crushed

and wounded

to

free us up

lubricate

our rusting

static lives

and

facilitate

our ever moving

onward

forward

Godward

Light …

revealing our past

lighting our future

shining like a lighthouse

in our storms

burning like a warning beacon

in our wars

warming like the sun

on our journeying

glowing like a fire

through gaps and cracks

in shattered, splintered lives

Water …

cleansing our grubbiness

reviving our tiredness

refreshing our thirstiness

nurturing our liveliness

babbling communication

rippling out our influences

May we -

baptised in water,

anointed by oil,

lit by the Spirit -

live and move freely

like a babbling brook

speaking life

to parched ground

leaping boulders and barriers

sparkling in the ever present

light of the Sun.

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St Edward's School - Cardboard Testimonies.